maskormenacelogs | CATCH-ALL FOR FEBRUARY (week one)

[ Persephone's trips to the art museums usually avoid the Modern Art wing at all costs. What's the point of serious business visual arts if they're not about mythology and people cutting off each others heads and stuff. But sometimes- sometimes something catches the eye that she can't simply walk past. In this case it is what would appear to be a totaled car, but for some reason here it is, as a central installation. ]

What kind of obvious garbage...

Edited 2017-02-06 01:56 (UTC)

[ Oh, it's not only a totaled car. It's a car with pizzaz. Which is to say, once Persephone takes a closer look at it, she'll notice an abundance of nonsense involved including (and mostly involving) an obscene amount of pink glitter and bedazzling and colourful ribbons hanging out of it, because Will and Jaime did exactly what they wanted to do that day, and that day, they felt like glitter.

He still has no idea what he thinks or feels about Persephone, but, well... he can't just avoid her forever. He might as well at least try to get to know her, figure out what exactly makes her tick. ]

What's so obvious about it?

[ It sounds like a genuine question, because it is. There is no message to it, not even after people have written articles about the divine subtleties of it. All it was was a broken car that he and Will had no time to fix up for class, so they decided to completely trash the thing, had a wonderful time with hammers, and then had an equally as wonderful time with glitter. If Persephone wants to talk about the obvious meaning, she can be his guest. All he knows is that there are checks with his and Will's names on it burning a hole in his pocket, and that's enough meaning for him. ]

[ Oh, it's this kid. She looks only mildly surprised to see him. The goddess considers him a long moment, as if judging whether or not to bother with his question. Then she turns back to the car, obviously having missed the little plaque naming Jaime the artist in question.

She sort of squints at the car, then tilts her head. When she does answer, it's not quite her normal dismissive tone. If nothing else, she does seem to be seriously thinking her answer out. ]

It's- careless. Like it wasn't meant to say anything.

Does it have to mean anything?

[ He holds his hands out in front of himself, as if defending himself from any ire she has about art. Jaime's not an art guy. Over the past few months, especially whenever he goes to events like these, he's learned that people have a lot of strong feelings about art, feelings that Jaime cannot possibly begin to unpack, or even to explain. To him, art's nice to look at, but he doesn't understand it, and it spurs emotion from him even more rarely than he understands it. His brain just doesn't work that way, he thinks. He doesn't need to think that way either. He's a working class guy, and that means that as long as his hands work fine, as long as he can eke out a living with them and live happily with his friends and family, he's okay with remaining unfulfilled when it comes to art.

But that doesn't mean he's not curious. ]

Just wondering, honest. I've heard a lotta people get into a lotta arguments about that over the past little while. I couldn't even begin to tell for most of these.

[ That construction with a plank and a boot on the end - does that mean anything? How do you even begin to tell? ]

[ She isn't nearly as passionate about other art forms as she is with music, particularly not here where the history is all wrong, none of artist she's familiar with. There's another long moment where she looks from his raised hands, back to his face, then back to the art. There's a huff of air. ]

Dunno. Modern art's not really my thing anyway.

So what kind of art is your thing? I'm assuming that's why you're here, right? 'Cause you're into art?

[ It's not why he's here, but Persephone has a healthy enough musical career for it not to be necessary to make bank on being, like, an oil painter or whatever it is she's into. ]

[ She glances back to the Classics wing, and Antiquities beyond it. She wouldn't consider herself into art, not in the way she's into music, or celebrity gossip, or Pantheon lore. It's hard for her to say exactly why she's there. She got the idea to see the painting of Orpheus's descent, sure. Who wouldn't want to see paintings of your own myths? But there's something else to it too. Some change in the way human creation speaks to her- like in seeing these perfectly mundane paintings and sculptures, there's the tiniest spark of the divinity she beheld as a human before a god.

Or maybe the white space and quiet gave her room to breathe and think without curling in on herself again.

Or maybe she was just nostalgic for the surreptitious meetings she held at just such places.

Or maybe it was none of his business and why was he even asking, huh? ]

I guess? Not really. They just had a painting with me in it, so I wanted to see.

Edited 2017-03-06 03:20 (UTC)

Oh, right! Even if they don't know like, you-you, they've known about a version of you for a while.

[ The Classics wing, also known as: that place that Jaime hadn't bothered pointing out. ]

So? Is it goddess-approved?

[ It was beautiful. More beautiful than she can remeber any painting being. She spent almost and hour and a half just staring at it. As if there were answers somewhere in the texture of the and the carefully shaded folds of their tunics. ]

It was OK.

[ Theres an uncomfortably long pause. ]

What about you? Are you. . . into art?

Edited (im sor) 2017-03-07 04:27 (UTC)

Um... [ He offers her a sheepish grin. ] Technically, yes? [ He raises one hand, gesturing towards the car. ] Technically, that is a Reyes-Graham production, so yeah, I've at least made some art. Ish.

[ He doesn't sound particularly boastful about it, mostly because he's not proud of it. It's just a dumb thing he and Will had fun with one day, and it took. It still makes him smile to look at it, but he's not exactly sure what the viewers are getting out of it except for a ton of well-intentioned bullshit. ]

But I'm not - I mean, I don't know much about it, generally speaking. If you got a spare minute, I wouldn't mind seeing that painting. I gotta broaden my horizons.

[ Rudely (as is her way), she totally ignores his request and looks back at his "sculpture." Then she looks back at him, and raises an eyebrow. ]

That's yours?

Yup. If you don't believe me, you can go check out the names on the little plaque. I didn't make it alone!

[ It's not that she doesn't believe him, but what else to do but look at the plaque? She raises an eyebrow and looks at him, then back at the art again. Her head tips and her lips purse, examining it far more earnestly than she had before. Finally, she turns back to him. ]

Why?

It was fun.

[ It's not the best answer in the world, but it's the one that springs to mind immediately. He grins a little, streching his hands out in front of him, almost apologetically. ]

Things were really messed up. We got this clunker to fix up for class, and like, I'd usually just complete the assignment, but... not then.

[ He had so much in his mind at the time. So did Will, he's sure. That's not why they trashed it, not like the write-ups say, but it's true that without the Russian invasion, he wouldn't have even dreamed of destroying school property instead of fixing it up. They just got all caught up in the moment. ]

Doing this seemed better. We gave it back to the school, and instead of suspending us, our professor gave the press a call.

[ She lets out a little huff of air. It could be the shadow of a laugh, or it could be a tiny snort. She's hard to read. ]

And then put it in a museum, huh?

Yeah, it all kind of spiraled from there. [ He laughs a little, but it sounds more self-conscious than it does malicious. ] People seem to like it. Or they walk past it and do the whole... [ He puts one hand on his chin, tilts his head up and squints thoughtfully and derisively over his nose before scoffing, ] My daughter could do that.

If the kids' into wrecking cars, sure.

[ That does get the tiniest glimmer of a smile from her, though. So he was just taking advantage of all the imPort frenzy, huh? Couldn't blame him for that. It's not like she liked modern art anyway. ]

Edited 2017-03-10 04:01 (UTC)

Which is why kids aren't making art! If they smear glitter all over their mom's minivan, they get grounded, not a place in an art museum.

[ He laughs at his own joke, because he's that kind of person. That, and he's sort of glad that Persephone isn't castigating him about art needing to mean something, or whatever. ]

But... yeah, there's the artist's insight. [ He puts one finger up to his lips. Don't tell! ]

Cross my heart.

[ Still deadpan, but willing to play along. She doesn't really see this as art- hell, if he'd defended it, she might have had to argue. But he didn't defend it. He said he was stressed, and did it for fun. Then for some reason he made bank on it too, so whatever. No skin off her pomegranate. ]

Is that why you're here, then?

Edited 2017-03-10 05:48 (UTC)

Yeah, they ask me to come in sometimes. I don't mind.

[ He gets paid. He's even toying with the check in his pocket right now. He'd probably come even if he didn't get paid, though; they like him here, and there are better ways of wasting an afternoon. ]

But I figured I might as well check out what else this place has to offer while I'm here. Or at least check out the cafeteria.

[ She looks at the clock on her phone, still a few hours yet before her show. ]

And how'd that work out for you?

It had been a little while since the blackout--its cause still unknown, but its effects not at all good. The fear and destruction wrought by the escaped criminals still disturbed Fuu a little. All right, yes, she had been attacked by people before, and she hadn't been hurt, but she still felt like it was a bad harbinger for the year ahead.

And speaking of people who might get hurt? Yes, Jaime had the healing powers from Khaji-san, but that didn't mean Fuu was going to assume he'd been fine. She scanned the skies as well as the ground as she walked around downtown and... was that him sitting on a roof with a McTavish's bag next to him? "Hello, Mr. Beetle!"

Jaime says something inaudible, because apparently he decided to cram half of his burger in his mouth at around the same time that Fuu greeted him. Well, not inaudible. It just sounds a lot more like "Hmffhoo hoo" than anything even remotely resembling actual human words. If her first impression is that he's no worse off for wear from that whole blackout ordeal, she would be right; he looks perfectly chipper from his perch, and there's certainly no sign of injury or weariness.

He does swallow eventually, wipes some ketchup from off of the corner of the mouth of his suit, then calls down: "Hello, Fuu! How's it going? Want a fry?"

He probably shouldn't drop it straight down on her if she says yes, although there's a part of him that's definitely contemplating it.

Hmffhoo hoo? Fuu tilted her head, cupping her cheek in one hand in a slightly theatrical manner as she tried to decipher that statement. Then she held up a finger, making sure the gesture was big enough that it was clear from the ground. "Oh! You were speaking in Beetlese! I would have thought that it would have more clicking sounds, but evidently that was quite presumptuous of me."

She smiled brightly, much too brightly. "It's a kind offer, Mr. Beetle, and it would be rude to decline."

~~she likes American french fries WHO DOES NOT~~

"Yeah, that's right," Jaime says with a little grin. "But we don't call it Beetlese, just for the record. That's like, bug-racist. It's Beetalian, thank you very much."

Jaime looks down at his fries, thinks better of throwing them down to her as they are, and has the questionable logic of wrapping some in a slightly greasy napkin before aiming at her (sticking out his tongue as he does so) and dropping the fries down at her.

"Catch!"

Victor had been directed to Venture Industries by some well-meaning local who was just so damn tired about answering Victor's nosy questions about electricity. Go to that Venture Industries place, bother that Rusty Venture guy, he owns a company, he knows about currents or breakers or whatever.

So, here Victor was, standing outside Venture Industries and looking really out of place since he's still dressed to his 1890s best. And now...well, he really doesn't know what to do. The obvious thing is to find Mister Venture and introduce himself to the man, but...well, he's got no idea how to do that. Just ask people? Is that it? It can't be that simple.

Eventually, Victor finds what looks like the entrance and gently pushes the door open. "Hello?" he tentatively calls out. "I'm looking for Mister Venture."

The lab itself isn't as impressive as it looks from the outside. From the outside, it looks like everything should be slick and shiny and new, everything in its proper place and experiments dotting the walls, some real sci-fi bullshit. Kind of like how Venture Industries used to look, back home. But as big as Rusty's ego is, it's not so big as to make this place look more impressive than it does.

Instead of a place of the future, it looks like a place that people work in. There's a line of robots along the back wall, each of them in some different shape or form - and, as can be gleaned, serving a different purpose - with every available surface scattered with different bits and bobs, some of them technological, others strictly biological in nature, mysterious things in vials and little burbling tanks filled with organic masses. There's also a table that's literally just filled with metal prosthetic arms.

And then there's Rusty, looking over some piece of paperwork with a mug of truly corrosive coffee in-hand, slouched in a chair. When he hears Victor's entrance, he sets the paper down and pushes off the ground, wheeling his chair freely into about the middle of the warehouse, not even bothering to get up as he remarks, "You know, you could always knock." He looks Victor over for just a second too long to be comfortable before saying, "Well, you're looking at Doctor Venture. What can I do for you?"

Please be a job. He wants some more of that sweet, sweet income.

Almost instantly, Victor's distracted. Not by the robots or the prosthetic arms, but by anything biological. He makes a beeline for those organic tanks, trying to figure out what they are and just trying to see how Venture managed to grow them in the first place. Because that...he honestly has no idea what it is, but it's certainly something he's never seen before.

It's only when he hears Venture's voice that Victor turns around, as if he had forgotten that he was at the other man's warehouse to begin with.

"Terribly sorry. I'm a new imPort here—my name is Victor Frankenstein." He already had a few people tentatively react to his name and Victor's fairly certain he's going to use a pseudonym sometime soon...but he kind of wants to impress Venture, or at least wants to impress on the man that he'd be a good candidate to talk about all of this scientific advancement with. "I was told that you would be a good person to talk to about this world's advances in electricity, but seeing this?" said with a gesture to one of the tanks. "I'd prefer to talk about this world's advancement in biology. Tell me, what precisely is that?"

Rusty arches a brow at Victor, but doesn't comment on his name otherwise. Victor Frankenstein. Of course. He's not sure whether he's supposed to be the real deal, some asshole megafan who changed his name upon becoming interested in the sciences or if he just has deeply unfortunate parents, but it's really none of his business either way. Not unless he gets into the actual business of animating dead bodies, which is Rusty's realm, thank you very much.

"Well. I can't say they're wrong, though do knock next time. You never know what I'll be up to in here, and you might get a face full of fire if you pop in uninvited again," Rusty says loftily which, yes, is also meant to impress the man. It's not out of an inclination to impress a fellow scientist so much as it is a desperate need to impress anyone at all, but hey, that's the way it goes.

"And frankly, you don't want to bother yourself with that stuff. Just small cellular experimentations, nothing spectacular. If you want to know some real advancements, you'll want to take a look at my robotics."

CATCH-ALL FOR FEBRUARY (week one)

[Art Museum, where totally cool and non nerdy children love hanging out]

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Excellent friend

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victor & rusty aka like literally the world's worst team-up

I'M LATEBUT ALSO READY

HELL YEAH

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